1. Technical Field
This disclosure generally relates to computer communication, and more specifically relates to a system and method for heartbeat failure detection by accumulating overage time beyond an expected time interval for each heartbeat in a sliding window of time.
2. Background Art
In high availability networking environments, redundant failover technology is commonly used to provide network connectivity with increased uptime and reliability. Some systems increase uptime of a network connection by directing network traffic through one of many potential network links. When an active network link becomes unreliable or unresponsive, the system switches to a backup link until the primary link becomes available again. Some failover systems employ a heartbeat mechanism within bridging logic of a network link that intermittently notifies the system that the bridge is still functioning as expected. If the system determines that the active link's heartbeat is missing or in some way unreliable, then the failover system can use this information to provoke a failover to another network link.
Prior art systems typically employ a heartbeat mechanism with configurable “delay” and “threshold” settings that allow the user to control how often heartbeats are sent, and the number of consecutively missed heartbeats that the system will tolerate before a failure is determined. These systems do not detect a network link that is operating marginally within the threshold where it may be continuously missing a number of consecutive heartbeats just under the threshold value.